In California’s San Joaquin Valley—home to many of the nation’s largest fruit, nut, and vegetable operations—agricultural soils have been sterilized and depleted of natural fertility. This trend in agricultural soil management is standard practice for industrial farming, and while it’s still possible to turn the trend around and begin managing soils to improve the health of the region, doing so requires an examination of the history of environmental justice (and injustice) in California.

In 1994, President Clinton signed Executive Order 12898, Federal Actions to Address Environmental Justice in Minority Populations and Low-Income Populations, a set of policies that required federal agencies to ensure the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income with respect to the environmental impacts of the development, implementation, and enforcement of federal programs and policies.

Among other state programs and policies that have been advocated for and created by environmentally burdened communities of color, the California Environmental Protection Agency (CalEPA) has released CalEnviroScreen, a mapping tool depicting communities that are affected by cumulative environmental impacts such as groundwater pollution, ozone, particulate matter, pesticide exposure, and other toxic pollution. Under Senate Bill 535, California directs 25 percent of the proceeds from its cap and trade program to climate investment funding in the state’s most affected areas.

May Young Vu, a Hmong farmer, harvesting cherry tomatoes on her farm May’s Flower’s in Sanger, California. (Photo credit: USDA)

These communities suffer the problems that arise from historic land-use policy in California, which has essentially been created by and for large agribusiness, and rarely prioritizes soil health or community health. Rather than building carbon and organic matter, the soil has been stripped of most of its life, and nutrients such as phosphorous and nitrogen get added back in through synthetic fertilizers.

As a result, over 1 million California residents are exposed every year to water that is unsafe to drink by state standards. In addition, many communities lack adequate wastewater infrastructure, housing, and perhaps the most importantly, a lack of governance. Many environmental justice communities were settled during the migration that took place when the Dust Bowl arose from Midwestern agriculture practices that pushed the land to its limit. A period of dramatic expansion of the fruit and specialty crop economy in California led thousands of migrants from across the country to move to California as field workers and packers.

During World War II, and with the implementation of the Bracero program, Mexican farmworkers and other communities of color moved into and continued to build these small California communities. They dug their wells by hand, and if electrification took place it was often done without proper oversight. The land-use policies in these communities were historically discriminatory, and in the decades since, larger municipalities haven’t annexed them to provide basic protections for their drinking water and air quality. These rural, unincorporated communities face a lack of local governance and some of the most acute environmental and climate impacts in the state.

Migrant workers harvesting sweet potatoes in Mechanicsville, VA. (Photo credit: USDA)

In unincorporated farmworker communities, residents deal directly with the harmful impacts of agriculture. Parents send their kids to school knowing they’re going to get exposed to pesticide drift. They are dealing with chronic disease, asthma, valley fever—a deadly infection caused by a fungus found in soil—on a regular basis.

Drinking water in the San Joaquin Valley primarily comes from groundwater wells. The area’s groundwater is often contaminated with nitrates, selenium, arsenic, and 123-TCP—a carcinogenic chemical that was recently regulated for the first time. These water contaminants are byproducts of pesticides and chemical fertilizers, or simply the products themselves, washed into the aquifer. This is a direct result of the way the soil in the area has been treated over time by chemical-heavy farming practices.

Crops in the region are mainly irrigated with surface water. The agriculture industry is constantly lobbying for access to more surface water because groundwater is expensive to pump and often contains large quantities of salt, which is the primary concern for farmers.

Meanwhile, 95 percent of the water going to people’s homes is ground water.

There has also been an enormous loss of native vegetation in the San Joaquin Valley because the agriculture industry has removed most of what was left of the native plants, animals, and people. We have lost nearly all ecological memory of the area to privatized industrial scale agricultural landholding.

A few important examples of alternative agriculture stand out. In Tulare County, an area known for its conservative approach to large-scale agriculture, Steven Lee of Quaker Oaks Farm is working to educate the local community on the importance of building soil carbon as a foundation to achieve environmental justice priorities. A recent recipient of funding through the Healthy Soils Initiative, Lee is planning to pilot a number of soil improvement practices on his land and gauge their ecological benefits. Quaker Oaks Farm shares historic ground with the Wukchumni Indian tribe of the region, and also with farmworking families of Oaxacan origin who use a portion of the land for subsistence farming.

Janaki Jagannath. (Photo credit: Jan Mangan)

Community Alliance for Agroecology has built a framework based on ecology that prioritizes the protection of the water and air in addition to building political power because we believe the historically underserved communities who have built our agricultural economy should have a say in how agriculture moves forward in the state. Healthy soil brings both short- and long-term benefits by protecting our waterways, our local air quality, and displacing chemical fertilizers and pesticides if built as a part of a natural soil fertility regimen.

We are at a point in California history where we need to be linking arms around soil protection. We have a state water board, and a state pesticide department, but we don’t have any direct oversight of our soils at the state level; soil health has been largely left to the discretion of private landowners.

Soil is the basis of our food system and we need to protect it—especially in areas like the San Joaquin Valley. To do that right, we must also include the voices of rural people of color and others who have been historically left out of the decision-making process around farming and land ownership.

A version of this article was originally published by Bioneers as part of their series on carbon farming.

The inevitable years of mistakes, false starts, financial hardship, emotional and physical exhaustion, scorn from local conventional farmers, perseverance and—at very long last—success, are documented with candor and humor in Preston’s book, The New Farm: Our Ten Years on the Front Lines of the Good Food Revolution, released in the U.S. earlier this year.

Brent Preston and Gillian Flies

Civil Eats talked to Preston about the lessons he and Flies learned from their first decade of rural experience, advice for other well-intentioned (and sometimes naïve) aspiring farmers, and what it might take to bridge the seemingly unbridgeable gap between conventional and organic farming.

By the time your book ended, you had figured out how to make a decent living growing four crops—salad greens, heirloom potatoes, beets, and Japanese cucumbers. What’s happened since then?

It has been two seasons since the book wrapped up, and two big things have changed. First, we built an on-farm event space and commercial kitchen, and that part of the farm has really taken off. The appetite for people to do things—anything—on a farm just exploded in the last few years, and that means there are more and more people we can tell about our method of farming. Plus, it’s become a decent revenue stream.

And second, our eyes have been opened up to the possibilities of regenerative agriculture. We are in the midst of a farmer-led research project run by an organization called the Ecological Farmers Association of Ontario. We’re conducting an on-farm trial this summer comparing the use of silage tarps as a means of killing salad stubble and suppressing weeds, as opposed to [tilling the soil]. It’s a challenge to reduce tillage in growing salad greens; they take three weeks from planting to harvest so there’s a lot of turnover, and they can’t have lot of residue. But we realized how damaging tillage is to the soil, and to the planet and climate on a larger scale.

What has all this taught you about soil science more broadly?

Sustainable farmers learned in the last decade that there’s an incredibly important symbiotic relationship between the plants that grow and the critters that live in the soil. The science [shows] what a massive impact regenerative agriculture at scale could have on atmospheric carbon dioxide, [by] storing it as stable organic matter. On the flip side, Jonathan Lundgren in South Dakota has been doing amazing research showing that the healthier your soil is, and the more soil organic matter you have, the more profitable your farm is going to be.

Soil microbiota excites some conventional farmers, too. Is this a topic of commonality, where the two “sides” can meet?

I’m getting goosebumps as you’re saying it. In the over 12 years we’ve been farming organically, we’ve encountered active hostility from conventional farmers; but the regenerative techniques and science are coming out of both the organic and the conventional sectors. This is a huge opportunity to start bridging that gap. I was at a conference this winter, hearing about some regenerative techniques, and sitting next to a guy who had been a conventional grain farmer his whole life; he was interested in this stuff simply because he can’t afford inputs for conventional farming anymore.

Another area [of commonality] is cover crops. I’ve read articles in The New York Times about conventional farmers using cover crops. There’s a depot down the road that sells [conventional] inputs and treated seeds; last year they put up a sign: “Ask us about cover crop seed.” I couldn’t have imagined that five years ago. There are larger ideas around regenerative agriculture that are rapidly creeping into the conversation, but it’s still early days. It’s going to take a lot of time for Cona [the conventional farmer from whom Preston bought his farm, who features prominently in the book] to come around.

To make agriculture more sustainable, advocates say we have to keep existing farms in business, not just start new ones. Do you see ways to do this?

This is a tough question, because it goes to the really big macro-economic problems with trade. The bottom line is that getting off the commodity bandwagon is important. A lot of farms that are failing are heavily invested in producing one or two commodities and when prices go down, there’s nothing they can do. [There needs to be] assistance for farmers to get out of big commodities and produce for local markets, or more sustainably, or to transition to regenerative techniques.

It’s going to come from individual farmers figuring out that this model of producing commodities and taking whatever the market will give isn’t going to work anymore. You’re not competing against your [farming] neighbors but giant corporations in Argentina and China; you’re not going to win against them.

Also, I talk about this in the book: We need to reduce our sole focus on production, because we produce too much food. There’s still an incredible demand for food with a story behind it, not just a commodity. Every year I think, “This is the year that demand [for my salad] slags off,” and every year, demand increases.

How do we go about making good food more accessible everywhere?

Shortening the supply chain is important; in the traditional supply chain, three or four people are getting paid: farmers, consolidators who pack [the produce], transporters, and brokers. If we sold into that kind of supply chain it would be way too expensive and no one would buy [our stuff].

Additionally, we have 18 acres of gardens, close to half in cover crops, and a certain scale is needed to serve the [five or six independent and medium-size markets] we sell directly to. They buy a lot of stuff, and consistency of supply is incredibly important—you have to have a whole season, no breaks. We deliver cut salads and cucumbers two times a week, get a good price, and because there’s no middleman, the [markets’ owners] can sell at a price that works for them.

Are you seeing an uptick in traditional grocery stores that want local, organic produce?

A lot of the produce in [the supermarkets we sell to] is imported from California or Mexico. It’s not because it’s what their clients want, or that it’s better quality, or cheaper, but it’s all they can get. All the supermarkets we sell to call us in spring to say, “We’re going to cut off California the moment you have salad ready.” These retailers respond to customer needs and demands, so if your local market is not carrying the local or organic food you want to buy, go talk to the produce manager. That makes a difference. Be an advocate for good food in your community.

What’s your advice for new, young farmers who want to avoid some of the pitfalls you encountered when you started?

There’s much more available in terms of formal training—lots of institutions of higher education offering degrees in sustainable agriculture. We also weren’t aware of apprenticeship and internship programs, where you take a season and work on someone else’s farm. It’s also important to recognize that growing food is not the only skill you need as a farmer. Lots of people do three, four, five seasons of unpaid internships because they think they need to learn growing. Then they don’t have the capital to start.

But in farming, everyone is an owner/operator and a lot of the things we went through in the early years are the same as in any entrepreneurial business. I don’t understand why people think farming is different—maybe because traditionally, farms were passed down through generations and a lot of people were taking over established businesses that their parents or grandparents started. As that changes, with more and more new entrants coming from non-farming backgrounds, they must realize this is a business. A lot of people who are just starting to farm are young and idealistic, and think that being focused on money is distasteful. But the fact is, if you don’t make money, you can’t achieve all the other things you want to do.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Photos courtesy of Brent Preston.

Sandwiched among dairy farms and fields of conventionally grown corn and soybeans outside Spring Valley, Wisconsin, Thao’s Garden, is the only immigrant-owned, certified organic farm for miles.

“We grow all kinds of vegetables,” says Phua Yang Thao, who owns the farm with her husband, Blia Tou Thao. Phua corrects herself with a laugh, “mostly Caucasian vegetables.” She says vegetables common to cooking in the Thaos’ community of Hmong Americans, like bok choy and Asian bitter melon, are not as popular in the Upper Midwest as crops like asparagus and rhubarb.

The 28-acre farm has been the Thaos’ full-time occupation since 2007, building on more than 40 years of farming experience in the United States. They grow a diverse complement of garden vegetables, including peas, carrots, potatoes, beets, and peppers, and raise 400 chickens for eggs and meat. Phua says they don’t use pesticides and have no need for irrigation—though sometimes, after a wet spring, they must wait for the soil to dry out before planting.

Consistent with the farming practices used in the Hmong culture, Phua and Blia weed and harvest exclusively by hand. That’s why, for the past several seasons, they’ve kept less than half their land under active cultivation, farming on the same 13 acres each year.

This hands-on approach leads to a farm powered by many hands. They have assistance from extended family members, many of whom live nearby in Minnesota’s Twin Cities, and they sometimes hire local people to help out. Their son Boun, who lives with them, works on the farm most summer mornings before making a one-hour commute to Minneapolis for his job in the Hennepin County library system.

Phua’s highest concern as a farmer is growing food without pesticides or synthetic fertilizers. “Organic foods must be the future,” she says. “The conventional American farmer uses too many chemicals.”

Back in Laos, she says, many of her friends and neighbors lived long lives and died in their sleep. But after more than 40 years in the United States, she has seen members of the Hmong community face health issues unheard-of in Laos. “Now we have heart attacks, cancer, diabetes, strokes,” she says. “Is this from the food?”

The Thaos were invited to give the keynote address at The Food Group’s Emerging Farmers Conference in Minnesota earlier this year. But their journey to this green patch of farmland in the Upper Midwest started thousands of miles away and decades ago.

The Secret War

In 1961, Blia was 21 years old when he left Laos for a year of military training in Thailand led by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). In the years that followed, he joined the 30,000 men who were to serve as CIA guerilla fighters during the Vietnam War. Their covert military operations are now referred to as the Secret War.

“I had some schooling when I was young,” Blia says, “so the CIA trained me to operate radios.” The job meant he was not on the front lines, but he recalls the challenges of traversing an almost entirely roadless region of rugged mountains and dense jungle in Laos. “Sometimes they would pick us up in helicopters,” he says. “But sometimes the helicopters did not come. Then we walked for days.”

After American forces left the region and communist leadership assumed control in 1975, Blia recalls, “The CIA said we must leave.”

Blia and Phua moved to a refugee camp in Thailand with their four children, and the family’s future was unclear. Blia gave birth to their fifth and youngest child, a daughter, in the camp. After a year, they learned they could move to the U.S.

“Because of the war,” Phua says, “we never farmed in Laos.” But agriculture had long been an important part of Hmong culture, and her parents grew corn, rice, and squash. In her youth, Phua learned from them while helping to raise her younger siblings.

The Thaos stablished their first farm outside Beatrice, Nebraska, where the family moved in 1976 after leaving the refugee camp. A local Lutheran church sponsored their move, and its members also helped them take night classes to learn English. Blia took a job as a janitor and inspector with AT&T and worked for the company for 22 years.

Blia and Phua moved to western Wisconsin after one of their grown sons, a medical doctor, moved to Minnesota’s Twin Cities, 50 miles west. And for the past 11 years, they have been part of the Upper Midwest’s farm community.

Contributing to the Local Organic Producers’ Community

The Thaos’ deep commitment to organics has helped them connect to a network of other producers in the region. According to a 2017 University of Wisconsin organic agriculture report, the state ranks second only to California in its number of organic farms, and third nationwide in organic acres.

It’s not clear how many organic farmers in Wisconsin are Hmong. But according to the 2010 U.S. Census, the state’s Hmong population of around 47,000 is the third-highest in the country, and Hmong producers are significant contributors to the area’s farmers’ markets.

Diane Mayerfield, the Wisconsin Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education state coordinator and an  outreach specialist with the University of Wisconsin-Madison Extension, notes that many Hmong producers in Wisconsin also grow ginseng to sell into the commodity market. But she says that diversified producer growers like Phua and Blia are more visible to the general public.

For example, Hmong producers at the enormous Dane County Farmers’ Market in Madison comprise nearly 20 percent of the market’s 270 members.

Many Hmong growers share Blia and Phua’s commitment to chemical-free farming, Mayerfield says, but the Thaos stand out for their full organic certification. They worked with the Spring Valley-based farmer resource nonprofit Midwest Organic & Sustainable Education Service (MOSES) to go through the process in 2012. They’ve also participated in trainings at the MOSES annual conference, the largest event of its kind in the U.S.

Blia and Phua know that organic certification makes their farm unique, but they’re reluctant to consider themselves innovators in other areas. More than anything, they prize the close personal connection they their land and their produce.

While the Thaos grow their produce in Wisconsin, all their off-farm sales occur in Minnesota. In addition to the farmers’ market, they have a contract to sell bulk produce to a Twin-Cities-based food hub, The Good Acre. The Good Acre works to expand producers’ access to markets, especially among immigrant and underserved farmers, and includes the Thaos’ vegetables in multi-farm CSA boxes.

“Their product is always good,” says Rhys Williams, executive director of The Good Acre. “Becoming a good farmer takes time, and I respect the work they do. And it’s all by hand!”

This summer, staff from The Good Acre will work with Phua and Blia to build an unheated high tunnel greenhouse at Thao’s Garden. Also known as a hoop house, high tunnels are season-extenders, Williams explains, because they provide protection from late-spring and early-fall frosts. “And since [The Good Acre’s] whole point is helping farmers make more money, season extension is one way to do that.”

They will also host a field day this fall for other farmers who are considering building their own high tunnels. Staff at the Good Acre and MOSES will invite other immigrant and underserved farmers to learn from the Thaos.

Family Traditions Take Root

The Thaos are grateful for the help they’ve been offered since coming to the U.S.—from Nebraska to Wisconsin. “Anything we need, we go to any neighbor,” Blia says.

Asked about the future of Thao’s Garden, Blia tells a story about Isabella, one of his 12 grandchildren, who lives in nearby Stillwater, Minnesota, and visits often to help on the farm. Recently she said, “Grandpa, someday I want to take over your farm.”

“I am 78 this year,” Blia says, a hint of concern in his voice. Then he smiles. “Isabella is 17.”